Bangladesh can learn from textile sector in Vietnam

By Cat Barton / AFP, HANOI

Workers walk past a textile factory on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on Thursday.

Photo: AFP

From factory fires to slave labor, the growth of mass manufacturing in Southeast Asia has not been problem-free, but after shedding its sweatshop reputation, the region could have lessons for Bangladesh.

Last week’s building collapse near Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, that left 550 dead or missing has unleashed global concern about conditions in the factories that produce fast fashion — cheap, catwalk-inspired clothes — for top global brands.

Amid talk of consumer boycotts, Bangladesh needs to reform its industry before fashionistas wonder “if they should be wearing bloodstained dresses,” Kalpona Akter of the Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity told reporter.

“It is not a race to the bottom here,” Tara Rangarajan, program manager of the International Labour Organization’s Better Work project in Vietnam, told reporters.

“Sweatshops are part of a short-term, immediate payback, low-cost strategy. [Vietnam wants to] be competitive in the long term on something besides just cheap labor” so it is trying to enforce and improve its laws, she added.

Buyers are attracted to Vietnam — where wages are about three times higher than Bangladesh — if “they have reputations they are trying to maintain,” she added.

Conditions in factories have improved over the last decade and workers say they are now treated with more respect by employers eager to retain trained staff and receive perks such as free accommodation and meals.

“When I started work, the salary was US$40 a month, now a good worker can earn US$350 to US$400 a month,” Nguyen Huu Linh, who has worked in a Vietnamese luggage factory for 18 years, told reporters.

“Technology has helped — we used to do so much manually, but now we have machines,” added 36-year-old Linh, who started on the factory floor and is now a line manager at the Saigon Luggage Company.

In contrast, Bangladesh has “specialized in low-cost production” and embraced the sweatshop model rather than investing in technology and upgrading, said Nayla Ajaltouni, coordinator of the campaign group Collectif Ethique sur L’etiquette.

“The industry has grown very quickly, [which] is why we’re seeing this concentration of chronic health and safety issues,” she said.

Outrage over the building collapse could prove a turning point, she said. Minimum wages were increased in Bangladesh in 2011 “not for philanthropic reasons, but because protests were starting to disturb the supply chain.”

“It is a bit cynical, but this disaster is also a critical point where brands can be pushed to move forward by the media, by citizens,” she added.

In Thailand, standards in factories improved significantly after a fire at a toy factory killed 188 people in 1993, although activists say conditions particularly in smaller factories can still be problematic.

In Cambodia, where the garment industry developed in the 1990s, avoiding the “sweatshop” label was a conscious strategy, with the country embracing an International Labour Organization’s Better Factories program — which union leaders say has only been minimally effective.